Elul is the Jew’s testing device ahead of the new year. For me, the lesson of Elul is made clear when I listen in our neighborhood to young and old practicing the sounding of the shofar.
Each day the notes get stronger. Then, on Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur, each ba’al tekiah (the congregation member who blows the shofar) climbs the peak before all assembled.
Hearing the actual sounding of the shofar makes me especially appreciative because a half-century ago there was another Elul when I could not even get a meager sound from my shofar. This is a tale that provided me with a lesson I will not forget.
Before making aliyah in 1977, I was a Conservative rabbi at the Beth Shalom congregation in Wilmington, Delaware. Our synagogue was most fortunate because our cantor was Andrew Salzer, a Holocaust survivor from Hungary.
When World War II ended, he and his wife and children could not obtain a visa to the United States. They had no one to sponsor them. Instead, they were permitted to enter Brazil. To earn a living, the family was given a house and a little store deep in an Amazon forest.
Salzers allowed into US
After a few years, the Salzers were finally allowed into the US. A relative heard about them and brought them to Wilmington, Delaware. They were given a delicatessen by the local federation, which was well located, and succeeded.
However, one day in Elul in the 1950s, Salzer went to the Beth Shalom synagogue to say kaddish. He was asked whether he could daven (pray), and gladly, he did. The congregation’s rabbi, Jacob Kraft, heard Salzer that morning and spoke with him. The rabbi urged the synagogue board to hire him, which they did.
His training in a synagogue choir in Budapest had poignantly brought Salzer’s beautiful voice to the synagogue.
A few years later, in 1970, Rabbi Kraft retired, and I became the rabbi of the synagogue. On a list in the United States for church and synagogue architecture, Beth Shalom is found there, noted for the bronze doors by Louise Kaisch enclosing the ark of the Torah scrolls. In Beth Shalom, we had daily minyanim (a minimum of 10 men needed to conduct prayers), which I know is still the case.
As I worked with the cantor, I learned that he had taught himself to sound the shofar. A friend had taught me, so during the month of Elul, Salzer and I alternated blowing the shofar.
One morning during Elul in 1973, when the synagogue was opened for the minyan, we discovered that it had been broken into – money collected for tzedakah (charity) had been stolen, and an attempt to take the air conditioner had failed because it was too heavy.
When we climbed the stairs to the second floor where my office was located, my door was ajar and the office – a mess. I had nothing there besides books, a portable typewriter, a few dollars, and my shofar. The typewriter was gone, and I realized the shofar had been moved from the shelf where I had left it.
Since it was my turn to blow the shofar, I took it down to the minyan chapel with me. Then the unexpected occurred. I tried to blow the shofar several times – no sound whatsoever. The minyan men and the cantor said, “Wait a few minutes, then try.” I put the shofar to my lips – nothing. I said aloud for all to hear: the thieves took the money, my typewriter, and stole the shofar notes.
This Elul, while we prepare for elections, we also pray for peace. Since October 7, we have been at war constantly. Can the powerful American President Donald Trump bring the war to an end?
As I think about my shofar, which would not sound but ultimately did, I recall one of Israel’s great athletes, tennis champion Shahar Pe’er.
Why remember her this Elul – you may ask?
At one point in her career, Pe’er, with a victory after a long drought, gave many people a boost. After being in the top 10 players in the world, slipping to somewhere down in the lower 100s must have been crushing for Pe’er.
However, she did not give up. “After the recent finals in Baku, where I lost,” she noted in the press, “I thought: ‘I’m not there, I cannot handle tennis anymore, I’m not strong enough for this.’”
This wasn’t the first time such doubts got the better of her, she said, adding that “in the past six months there were at least five or six times when I said: ‘All right, I’m done with tennis. I had a great career and reached amazing places, but enough is enough. There are more important things in life.’”
But Pe’er focused on what tennis meant to her, which is why she won that Suzhou tournament in China after losing in Baku. “All in all, I have something which I really love. I love being on the court,” Pe’er determined.
Then she informed her listeners why she had succeeded in the past and hopefully in the future. Her coach had told her: “If you have lost your love for tennis, quit, but not because of what your ranking is.”
So Pe’er, back then, made the court her personal crucible, in which she would remake herself, calling on inner strength. None of us can know how much she practiced, but the results were evident.
We all have our chance on the court of life. Maybe our serves have been ineffective, maybe our backhand has failed us, maybe a few lobs go over our head.
But we know down deep that we, too, can draw upon our inner strength. We can make that major pitch; we can help our children when it is not so easy; we can finally see our experiment work; we can tread forward in our lives.
I can even blow the shofar again.
Clearly, innovative steps we have feared to take need to be taken. We must all commit and move forward. Elul is the Jew’s testing ground before the new year. Though we intone them regularly, prayers can take on new meaning if we focus on what the words really mean and what the shofar sounds tell us.
My suggestion is to take Elul one day at a time; try to raise yourself just a little every day. When all the small elevations are stitched together, you are ready for the challenges of the High Holy Days, and then, of course, for the new year 5787.
In memory of my beloved wife, Rita z’l, on her sixth yahrzeit.